Pictures and One Thousand Words
by Wynter Spite
Summary: The Doctor is a wonderful man.


The Doctor is a wonderful man.

But not when he's alone. On his own, he isn't held back from the ruthless person he could become. He isn't nearly so alive as when he can share his wonder. Because the Doctor is fire, raging with his words and illuminating the shadows. Everything he touches burns as bright as the sun, and is only extinguished by the cold touch of Death and the cracks of a breaking heart.

His companions know this, for they have watched him hurt from those cracks, and they try to heal him as best they can. Sometimes they fail. Sometimes it hurts more. Nevertheless, they were, and remain, absolutely magnificent.

Strange creature he is; glowing with his light. He is very much a part of the universe and its clockwork mechanisms. Time need not carry him along, for he will take it upon his windup wings and wield numbers as they are golden breaths in his lungs.

And he will love. He will love with all of his hearts, for it isn't his mind that makes him beautiful, though that is a large piece of him.

He is beautiful because he cares. He cares so deeply and powerfully that it comes through his voice and touch and gaze and everything that makes him so very fierce. He is the most feared being to ever love humanity, and it is that very love that makes him so terrifying to face down. He is forever. They know that. He knows it, too. They don't realize how sad it is.

But he _does._

He does.

The Doctor thrives on miracles and impossible things. He is pure, unadulterated vitality. It spills over, rolling out from his being and crashing over all that is before him, a wave of creativity that envelops entire spheres. He's everything that dwells within venture, exhaling science, hue; a fierce cleverness. A great majesty. His name is delight, guardian, guide, desolation, resolve, savior. He is friend, curiosity, joy, loss.

His name is **mercy.**

He is vibrant, so very vivid. A meteorite, still afire, searing the night sky with its radiance. The Doctor is a star, ever shining on, never going out. Not where you can see it. He's beautiful and extraordinary, so alive and yet so alone. He wishes life into the darkest of worlds, dancing in the loneliest of places.

The Doctor is gravity. Wherever he goes, something must fall. Inevitably, it must also break. He's the greatest of adventures, never turning back or running away. At least . . . not from the future. Not from adversaries. But demons need to keep to the side, so as not to hurt him irrevocably. He needs to still be whole. But he can't, and so he will be alright.

(But it's perfectly fine. He's always alright.)

He's a warrior, a soldier. He finds a cause to fight for everywhere he should go, stumbling upon reasons to save someone once again. He must have an objective, a purpose. Else he's just wandering aimlessly, unhindered and unneeded.

He is a butterfly, flitting this way and that, touching upon the earth only to fly off again, farther than before. Never stopping, never remaining in the same place for long. Never forever. It's just not in his nature.

Because he is a world of his own, ever growing, ever expanding to counteract his impossible splendor. A world that constantly changes, and yet stays perpetually the same. His sky is red and his trees are silver, his realm the most glorious of them all. The wind whispers and murmurs, beckoning and telling you to stay away.

"_Everyone dies_," it sighs, wrapping you in its tight embrace. Hoping to never let you go, and also to keep you inconceivably safe. For he is the sad man, the last child of time, the empty hearts. He is a galaxy of memories and emotions, names and realities. He's life in the most brilliant of bodies, an overwhelming amount of energy in the form of one entity.

He'll want to keep you in his lonesome hold, and yet he'll free you from his life with the same grace with which he has let so many walk away all those times in the past. Or he'll let you go even when you don't want it, because he is saving you once more. Saving you from yourself. Saving you from him.

The Doctor is frightened.

He sees such things, such beautiful, terrible things. He's not afraid of them. They are what they are, and he thinks that they are glorious. His fear isn't something of bad dreams or monsters hiding themselves away in the darkness. He doesn't fear dying or pain, poverty or sickness.

What he fears is himself, and he is right to do so.

But he'll continue to visit worlds, those that are mad and unbalanced and often violent with either hunger or greed or hatred or terror. He'll save the ones who need saving and listen to the ones who need someone to hear them. He'll continue to encounter those who would destroy and those who would conquer, waiting for their chance to burn down this brilliant man and bring him to his knees.

People will die, as they are wont to do. People will fight, because they have to. There will be murder, and passion, and fear. People will kill, as they have done for far too many years. The Doctor's friends will leave, taking a shard of him with them, wherever they will go. The Doctor himself will fight, protect, cast dread into the hearts of those who regard him as the danger of all.

He will walk over lands soaked with blood, and perhaps his will add to it. He will stand before great places as they fall, and mourn them when it's over. Companions will find him, take him away to where he doesn't always have to hide. They'll ease him, trust him, make him feel so alive. And they will die.

And he will love.


End file.
